


Through the Storm

by Nemonus



Category: Pyre (Video Game)
Genre: Found Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2019-09-04
Packaged: 2020-10-06 20:44:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20513228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nemonus/pseuds/Nemonus
Summary: Big Bertrude struggles to fit in with the Nightwings, and her queasiness about flying doesn't help. Companionship comes from an unexpected source.





	Through the Storm

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Siver](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Siver/gifts).

The movement was all wrong.

The blackwagon swayed. Bertrude should have been used to uneven movements, she thought bitterly to herself as she clung to the side of the flying contraption and tried not to look down. Certainly, she had modified the blackwagon to survive the harshest storms at sea, and certainly it had been good work that enabled it take to the air thereafter.But she was a land creature, and the swaying of the flying wagon made her head spin. Her claws would not sink into the wood, no matter how tightly she wrapped her hands around the gunwale, no matter how she wanted them to.

The blackwagon’s wings were paddling through a gentle storm. Gray clouds massed around it, and the wind blew in sharp, unpredictable bursts. She knew she should go outside, but the swaying had sickened her in there. At least out here she could see if they were about to collide with something, or know the exact moment when the blackwagon began to tip over too far. Knowing was bad, but not knowing was _worse_.

She wasn’t meant for the air. She had agreed to take up the mask of Molten Milithe. Of course, some discomfort would follow. But flying? It was almost too much.

The blackwagon was never going to be like home. Big Bertrude’s sat on a smelly patch of ground, a strong, single high-ceilinged platform on stilts too low to slither between. When she built a meeting-place for bog-dwellers, she built low and dark. She understood the shifts of the ground there, and how to move without falling into sucking mud. With the blackwagon flying high in cloudy air, she felt like she would fall no matter where she crawled.

She looked from the gray clouds to the railing and back again, hoping one of them would bring some relief. Perhaps if she listed recipes in her head, every poison she knew, she could think of something other than the endless, shifting sky.

She bowed her head, hoping that if she stopped looking at the sky, she would lose the urge to hex the whole thing down herself.

The door behind her opened. Jodariel frowned out at the sky. Behind her, the smell of warm broth floated out from bubbling soup. Bertrude caught a glimpse of the Reader, Hedwyn, and Rukey side-by-side, their small forms strange silhouettes to eyes accustomed to hardier folk. The imp’s chirping words and the little sounds of a crowded room were almost reminiscent of the sounds of social bog-dwellers at ease at home, though. If she just ignored what her eyes were telling her, she could pretend she was home. It almost sounded right, but not enough.

And then there was Sandalwood. Now that they traveled together he was close enough in proximity that she could hear him breathing, but he was still unable to connect with her the way she wanted. Perhaps this was adding to her discomfort. She would have a long time to think about it. Bertrude had lived a long life, and knew the mercy of time. 

Bertrude wasn’t planning to reveal her worry to anyone, and in fact she would sooner they spit on her than pity her. Luckily, Jodariel didn’t seem interested in commiserating. She shut the door, closing off the warmth and yellow light in exchange for the narrow, swaying deck.

The place where the steps of the blackwagon folded out was barely wide enough for the two of them to stand next to one another. Bertrude bared her teeth in a silent snarl as Jodariel’s horns brushed her shell.

Luckily, Jodariel didn’t seem to want to talk about the storm.

“Your talents will be welcome in the rites,” Jodariel said.

“Yes. We can tear up other bog-crones like roots push up rocks,” Bertrude said.

“Heh. I hope so. And you’re certainly very sure of yourself.”

Jodariel’s ambiguous tone tested Bertrude’s patience. “Do you seek to frighten or console me, demon?”

“Neither. If anything, I wish to thank you. You did not have to join our team. But you did, and now we are something new. The arrival of the Reader changed everything for us.” Jodariel gave a tight smile. Like a general inspecting her troops, Bertrude thought.

“Yes. In all my travels, I have never seen one like that,” Bertude said.

“It will be a long road. But I believe we can find redemption,” Jodariel said.

The soldier-like tone reassured Bertrude that Jodariel was here to neither pick a fight nor pity her. In fact, Jodariel was good at making sure people were all right without implying they were cowardly in the process. Even when Bertrude was feeling prickly, almost wanted to take offense as an excuse to have something to do, Jodariel’s tone reassured and calmed her.

That meant she could confide in her, perhaps.

Bertrde loosened her hands from around the gunwale. “Forsooth, one element concerns us. The elements in the bog, the earth and the water, are familiar to us. Not so this dark and violent sky …"

“Indeed!” The voice thundered from near the floor.

Bertrude shuffled around to see the door open behind her and the little wyrm knight silhouetted in the yellow light. Jodariel’s expression of surprise showed Bertrude that she hadn’t heard the door open either. Foolish. She almost raised her hands to attack. But, there was to be no cursing of Bertrude’s teammates just for the crime of sneaking up on her. Sandalwood had said so.

Sir Gilman kept talking. “Be bold! None of us were meant to tumble through such skies, yet here we are! Feast while you can!”

“We were not afraid,” Bertrude hissed.

“Soup is ready!” Sir Gilman crowed. Then he looked at Bertrude. “Pardon me! Did you say something, my lady?”

“Nay,” hissed Bertrude, and followed him.

* * *

The storm did not let up all that afternoon. In the evening, Jodariel and Hedwyn agreed that it would be safest to land for the night. Even the inhospitable mountains below would be safer than flying through the skies with just a lantern to light the way. Even Sandalwood was not omniscient enough to prevent a wrong turn so gradual it could hardly be seen. One of those occasions of bumping hulls with other flying ships that were so common during the day could prove much more disastrous at night. Hedwyn passed out evening helpings of soup. 

Bertrude held hers, dissatisfied with the spices the boy had chosen and the amount of meat in the broth but too happy to be on the ground to grumble about it. The others laughed and talked, Sandalwood making carefully chosen comments like he had in the old days. Bertrude found herself more comfortable than she had been since she joined.

It was therefore especially unfortunate that her mind was so unwilling to sleep. That night, the blackwagon’s largest bunk felt cramped and clammy. Even on the ground, she was still plagued with a possessive, angry homesickness. Where were the swamp animals? Where was the sunlight through the mist? Mist and fog had different qualities, different weights. She knew how to read only one of them.

She made her noisy way into the hallway, not bothering to soften the slam of the door. Standing in the cold, dark common room did not assuage her irritation. Sandalwood had insisted that she join the Nightwings, and so she had, but for now she wanted to be among bog-dwellers she knew, her tools and tinctures on her own table.

As she opened the door, she realized there might be more than her homesickness to contend with. Howling filled the night. Something shuffled in the woods. She moved onto the packed earth around the campsite. Someone had used this site before the blackwagon had landed. In fact, from the tracks she had found earlier it had been many someones. The Howlers knew to watch for when new prey arrived here.

Usually Howlers knew to avoid bog crones, too. There were far more dangerous things in the wilds than even a large pack of Howlers. But if they isolated one person, and didn’t know the others were even here—

Sir Gilman slithered out of the woods. He panted, his head held so low she could not see his eye.

“Beware! Attack by night!” Gilman thundered.

_Surely the pack would not destroy him._

“Get thee back to safety.” Bertrude waved toward him.

She recognized now that the sounds she had been hearing had been him casting his aura into the pack, but it had been many small bursts, not a wide one. Bertrude cast her magic into the forest in a wide wave. Wounded howls and puffs of magic sounded in the woods. When a lone Howler peeked through the trees, Gilman struck it down. Smoke hissed into the night. Silence fell heavily. Bertrude could hear wind in the trees. The forest noise came back, creature calls filling the empty space the hunting Howlers left.

At least the ground wasn’t moving.

Gilman scooted to Bertrude’s side. “Thank you, my lady.”

“After facing the gulf of the very skies, common beasts prove no trouble,” Bertrude said. She couldn’t help but frown and grimace, realizing just then how tired she still felt. As she turned to go back inside and try to curl up into her shell, Gilman spoke again.

“I understand I paid you a slight earlier, by overhearing a conversation. I will not commit this sin again by mentioning the conversation’s contents! I wished to correct this mis-step, only to find that you saved me at risk of yourself. A noble action! In thanks for it and apology for the interruption, I present to you this talisman.”

He held out a string. Objects had been tied to it with more black string, thick knots pulled tight around the shafts of feathers, the bellies of crystals, and one coin stamped with a Nightwing seal.

“When didst thou make this?” Bertrude asked the question in all honesty. He would have had very little time to do it, between the afternoon and that very moment. Sir Gilman was possessed of rapidity of both tail and speech, but she did not think it possible that he had conjured the talisman from the air.

“Knights are well trained in heraldic arts! That means crafts! Along with other skills.”

Bertrude tipped the talisman back and forth between her claws. It was well-made and heartfelt. Emotion welled up in her; emotion like swamp water, thick and impossible to see through to the bottom. Part of her suspected that a gift like this might be cursed, while another part quashed the feeling down. No one of the Nightwings would poison her so. They would not want to hurt one of their teammates, but more importantly, each individual was valued by the group.

Maybe that had frightened her too, in the sky. She did not lead this group, did not speak like them or understand how they related to each other. But she trusted them, and she would follow Sandalwood and she trusted the sigil he had asked her to wear.

Sir Gilman had also been thinking of magic. “While it does not hold magic, may it remind you of our common bond! Perhaps, you could think of it as a charm against airsickness?”

Bertrude closed her claws around the tangle of string and objects. “I thank thee, strange wyrm.”

Gilman gave her a smile that extended as a barely-restrained wiggle to his entire body. He dashed back inside. Through the partially open door Bertrude could hear the a creak as someone turned over in their narrow bed or stood to find out what Gilman had done. A cool breeze blew from the forest, bringing scents of earth and trees. Bertrude placed a hand against the side of the blackwagon. Just like the ‘charm against airsickness’ was not truly magic, there was no magic either in the survey she made of the team. She simply listened to the silence in the wake of the creaking, and smelled the dusty-clean odor and the wet-fur undertone.

When they flew tomorrow, she would hold the talisman tight and let no one see that she did. She would think of how she trusted her team and they trusted her. And she would wish for land, but not despair so terribly that she was in the sky.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed your exchange fic! Pyre delighted me as a game but I had never written fic for it before, so any first-fic mistakes will be corrected as I discover them.


End file.
